“Something, but I do not recollect all the particulars; Edda herself knows but little. The families keep up no communication, I fancy.”
“But slight,” said Morton, not liking to enter too minutely into particulars, and yet deeply interested. “I have news from Shetland occasionally, but I have not been there since I was a boy.”
“Shall I tell Miss Armytage that you know her family?” asked Mrs Edmonstone, with some hesitation.
Ronald considered a moment. “I will beg you not to do so,” he answered. “There can be no object gained. She knows nothing of my family, and probably takes but little interest in Shetland itself, while I have reason to know that her father has not for many years been on good terms with Sir Marcus Wardhill.”
“Probably you are right; I will do as you wish,” said the lady, and she kept her word.
Supper was over, and the guests began to take their departure. Morton and Glover saw Mrs Edmonstone and Miss Armytage to their carriage, and were going back to wait for the rest of their shipmates, when a young man in military uniform stepped up to the former, and, politely bowing, said that he had been deputed by his friend, Lieutenant Maguire, to demand the only reparation which one gentleman could afford another, for an insult he had that evening received.
“Assuredly, sir, you mistake my identity,” answered Morton, calmly. “I am not acquainted with Lieutenant Maguire, nor have I insulted, intentionally or otherwise, any human being.”
“Some people entertain very different notions to others as to what is an insult,” said the officer, with a sneer, intended to excite Morton’s anger. “My friend Maguire is exceedingly sensitive as to his honour. Not to lose time, sir, by any circumlocution in my remarks, you are, sir, I am led to understand, Lieutenant Morton, of his Majesty’s frigate ‘Thisbe’?”
“I am, sir,” said Morton; “your information on that point is correct.”
“I knew I was right, sir,” said the young officer, with a bullying air, mistaking a look of astonishment, which Morton could not suppress, for an exhibition of fear. “Mr Maguire conceives that early this evening you purposely tripped him up, and when you had brought him to the ground, you carried off his partner and laughed at him. Any one of these acts, sir, was an insult, to be washed out only with blood, as any man with a spark of honour in his composition will allow.”